


Stormblood

by Shadowpingers



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Banter, Canon Compliant, Dialogue, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, M/M, Oneshot, Rewrite, Shipping, Weird Shit, idk - Freeform, self indulgent bullshit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-04
Updated: 2019-07-04
Packaged: 2020-06-03 16:34:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,825
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19467853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shadowpingers/pseuds/Shadowpingers
Summary: Literally just a writeup of the last quest of Stormblood, as per how one weary Warrior of Light might've endured it. And Zenos's monologue, taken directly from the cutscene. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯





	Stormblood

**Author's Note:**

> bloody hell this fic is the _embodiment_ of *squishes WoL and Zenos together* I shit you not
> 
> anyway this's been sitting in my drafts for about 4 months now so ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ here you go

The Warrior stands in a dream. Gentle, fragrant winds ruffle his golden blonde hair, warm against his bared skin. Hours have passed since the assault on Ala Mhigo began. His legs ache, nerves aflame with the strain of dodging and running for far too long. Yet he holds his rapier and crystal aloft, staring down the generous backside of Zenos yae Galvus – his most dearly beloved foe. He could stike now, yes, and save himself the trouble of having to slay the thricedamned primal floating just above Zenos’s head. But he can’t.

_‘You deserve better than that.’_

“Welcome to my pleasure garden.” Zenos spreads his arms out, voice a bittersweet melody to the Warrior’s ears. “The King of Ruin built this place for his foreign queen. He kept it filled with familiar creatures from her homeland. They bored me all.” He turns, wicked smile stretching all the way to the corners of his eyes, predatory. “You, however…”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake.” The Warrior shakes his head. “Savage I may be, but beast I am not.”

“Most certainly.” Zenos takes a few steps forwards and at once the Warrior tenses, ready to fight. “Cast your gaze to the divine specimen behind me. Your fates are entwined, are they not? This dragon, this… embodiment of unbridled despair, born of a desperate man’s burning hatred for the Empire…” Pure admiration swells in his chest and he sighs, eyelashes fluttering. “How raw the raging tempest that churns within its breast. No myth made manifest this, but… a being of pure violence.”The way Zenos gazes at it is almost fatherly, proud. The Warrior’s never seen him look so happy, and holds his tongue. Poor Zenos has finally lost it. At least he’ll be out of his misery soon.

“Hah hah! Mayhap you are the true architect of our design.” Zenos continues, eyes rolling to gauge the Warrior’s reaction. “You who fought the very soul of vengeance to the edge and watched him fall; you who let slip the Allagan hound to drive this eikon into my arms!”

The Warrior’s lips press together into a thin line. _‘I had no choice.’_

Zenos tilts his head to the side, long hair falling in a silken cascade along the curves and points of his armor. “Oh, my. Have I said too much? Forgive me, this… sensation is wholly unfamiliar to me.” He doesn’t look apologetic in the slightest, simply smiling that mad smile of his with his eyes open wide. Too wide. It’s unnerving.

The Warrior wonders what he feels, this towering behemoth of a man who fights like a God. Ease and grace in every motion, with not a hint of struggle against even the mightiest foes. He stares into Zenos’s glittering blue gaze and listens to what falls from his lips.

“A question, then– and I should like very much for you to speak from the heart. If I were to stand aside, what would you do to this eikon?” A gesture to said eikon and then Zenos is right in front of him, blotting out the sun. The Warrior takes a step back, thigh-high boots crushing the pink and white flowers beneath him. Zenos doesn’t move, instead eyeing him hungrily. He breathes deep of the Warrior’s thinly veiled terror – and picks up a note of something else. Something piteous, heartfelt, that he’s never known before. He quirks a fine blonde brow up and prompts the Warrior with a warm smile.

“Well?”

The Warrior says nothing. What can he say, with body taut and mind blank save the chant of _do it, do it, do it_? He lowers his gaze and squints at the ground. _‘I’m not here to make conversation. Just… just keep on monologuing, it’ll be easier to kill you when it’s done. Don’t… don’t speak to me. Please.’_

“Hm. You will not indulge me even with a simple reply, then? No. You think only of the fight to come. How alike we are.” Zenos breathes each word in sweet seduction, voice the perfect blend of velvet and steel. “Ohh… such a pity. There is another alternative. Or there would be… had you only mastered your abilities.”

The Warrior looks up, and Zenos delights in having finally piqued his interest.

“I speak of the Echo, of course. Does it merely render you immune to eikonic influence? Or is it rather that your influence is far greater than theirs? Heh, and you only ever though about killing them.” He turns, gazing once more at the massive dragon floating in stasis above him. “But when I read van Baelsar’s reports, I immediatelly saw the boundless potential of the Echo. I saw how it could be instrumental in binding an eikon to one’s will. Hence my research and the Resonant– and oh so much more!”

“Oh, no.” It slips from his mouth before he can reign it in. The Warrior nearly drops his crystal as the realization dawns on him. “Don’t tell me-”

Zenos isn’t listening, and rambles on. “All eikons must be exterminated, without exception. Such was the imperial mandate issued by my great-grandfather after he saw firsthand the destruction wrought by one such being. They are a blight upon this star, he felt, and so he began his great and just crusade.” For all his posturing, the man wants for genuine conviction and spits out his next words. “Pah! ‘Twas not justice which spurred his campaign, but fear! Fear of the eikons, fear of their power. Cowardice made them march forth to battle. Pathetic!”

Before the Warrior can ask Zenos why _he_ fights, the answer comes straight out of the prince’s mouth.

“Man should fight for the joy of it. To live, to eat, to breed– lesser beasts snap and howl at one another for this. Only man has the wisdom and the clarity to embrace violence for its own sake.” His eyes are closed as the words roll from his shapely lips, and thus does he miss the change in his foe’s eyes. The Warrior stares at nothing, contemplating Zenos’s words.

 _‘Why… why do **I** fight? In the beginning, it was because the Scions told me to… that they needed me, and have ever since. But… but it’s not fun anymore. Everyone just… falls. Like I did, the first time I met you.’_ His violet gaze refocuses on the armored monstrosity before him. But it is not a monster he sees – merely a man, speaking from a heart so blackened it only beats in self-defence. Only when threatened does Zenos feel alive. And the Warrior weeps for him.

“For we who are born into this merciless, meaningless world have but one candle of life to burn.” Zenos looks to the Warrior, sees how his eyes have misted. Why, he does not know, but presumes it’s because one of his many words has struck true. “I know you understand this. You and I are the same.” He lowers his voice to a deep, rich purr. “Together, we could while away the quiet hours, as friend and confidant… if you will accept me.”

The Warrior blinks. Zenos blinks right back at him, and there in that moment, they connect. Echo-born and Resonant see, for the first time, what it is to be the other. The Warrior feels fear – so much fear it prickles at his skin and clutches his chest.

_‘You are scared of me…?’_

Zenos feels confusion, frustration, like a means to an end after being used by so many people he’s lost count of them all.

_‘What will you say?’_

There’s too much information, and the Warrior can scarcely make heads or tails of it. He draws breath, then, and looks Zenos right in the eyes. (Well, just two of them.)

“I accept you.” For all the strain in his exhausted body, his voice rings clear. Zenos raises his brows, honest shock flickering on his face for just a moment.

“Is that so…? Are we to embrace now, and believe that you’ll throw away your oh-so-honorable ideals just for me?” The look on his face infuriates the Warrior beyond measure, a combination of disbelief and mockery. The height of arrogance. And the Warrior has had _enough_.

He throws down his sword, his crystal too. Zenos jolts, staring at the discarded weapons. Glances back to the Warrior, who rolls back his shoulders and steps forth. Complete and utter astonishment spreads across Zenos’s face and the Warrior wants to laugh – he can read him like an open book, now that he’s seen his heart. Now that the Echo has blessed them both.

“Yeah.” The Warrior marches right up to him and Zenos doesn’t even draw his sword, so awestruck is he. “I know you want to fight. And honestly, so do I. But I need some time to prepare.” Standing before the prince, he has to crane his neck up to look him in the eyes. Zenos, at eight and a half fulms _towers_ over the five-something Warrior, whose face barely reaches his chest. Zenos unwittingly takes a step back and stares down at him, at a loss for words. For once, he’s silent. And then he _feels_.

“You… and I, so close it would only take a second to cut either of us down. You live for these moments– when all hangs in the balance… when the difference between life and death is but a single stroke.” The rush of blood sings through his veins, heart hammering with excitement. The Warrior may be disarmed, yes, but his reflexes are beyond compare. It’d only take a flash for him to backflip out of reach and pick up his rapier in one deft motion, elegant and deadly as Zenos himself. With joy bringing him close to tears, the prince bends to look his foe – nay, _friend_ in the face. The Warrior’s resolute gaze meets his own of unbridled ecstasy, his acute sense of danger reaching orgasmic heights.

“I live for them too!” Zenos breathes, reveling in the first common ground he’s ever shared with a living being. “This is who we are, my friend! Oh, only you I would take as my companion.” He stands up and draws his sword, slicing through the air before the Primal. Its cage begins to fall apart, and raw energy envelopes Zenos’s magnificent form. “Who cares for Ala Mhigo, let us fight!”

“Wait, wait!” The Warrior begins scrambling backwards, to both grab his weapons and make haste out of there. “I told you I needed time to prepare!”

Zenos isn’t listening, and there’s an all-encompassing light shining behind his levitating figure.

“We tower above the gods! You by your gift, I by my might!”

“Seven hells, do you EVER listen?”

“And before the Resonant the gods shall be made to kneel!”

The dragon consumes Zenos whole, and what happens next is a blur. But when the Warrior opens his light-seared eyes next, he sees an enormous figure comprised of both Zenos and the Primal, ready to vore him into oblivion.

“AN ENDING TO MARK A NEW BEGINNING!”

[Insert Shinryu Fight Here]

By the end of their fight, the Warrior can barely stand. Blood trickles from the manifold cuts in his skintight robe, sweat-slick chest heaving as he gasps for breath. Only by the _thump_ of Zenos’s body hitting the ground does he rise, and crawl over to the soon-to-be corpse.

 _‘How the **fuck** did you survive that?’_ He thinks, running trembling hands over the Garlean’s face. _‘How did **I** survive that, even?!’_ Zenos isn’t dead, not yet, inhaling and exhaling feebly.

“Nghh… ahhh… hahh… the hunter… has become… the prey.” He cracks open an eye, then the other, and gazes lovingly at the Warrior. “And yet… there is only joy. Transcendent joy that I have never known. How invigorating, how… pure, this feeling.”

“That’ll be the endorphins before you die.” The Warrior coughs, plastering his hand to the side of Zenos’s face. “Can you feel that?”

Zenos grins. “Barely.” His fingers twitch towards his revolver, struggling to pull out a single katana. “My heart has been yearning for such a moment of clarity, of liveliness, for so very long. No further moment will surpass this one. And as such, no more shall follow it.”

The Warrior puts a firm stop to that by sitting directly on his forearm. Zenos grunts, blood spurting from his lips.

“If you think I’m going to let you kill yourself after all we’ve been through, you’ve got another thing coming.” His sensitive ears twitch at the sound of Zenos’s labored breathing and very distant voices. He picks out his allies among the blurred clamor of war and knows they’ll be here soon. “We’re going to have company soon.”

“No!” Zenos chokes out, turning his hand away from the revolver and grasping desperately at whatever he can reach. His fingers sink into something soft and plush that makes the Warrior of Light squirm and blush. “I won’t let anyone… else… have this moment!”

“Hrk!” The Warrior isn’t wearing much in the way of undergarments beneath his tattered chiton, black with flecks of blood and crystal shards stuck in the fabric. “I- At least invite me to dinner first before you grope me like that! Eesh. Get… get up. I won’t let you die here.”

“I want to…” Zenos groans, reaching again for a katana when the Warrior finally gets off him.

“Well too fucking bad! I’m not letting the greatest damn samurai on this star die at the age of twenty.”

“Twenty-six…”

“ALRIGHT!” Summoning what little strength he has left, the Warrior proceeds to drag a stumbling, crawling Zenos yae Galvus into a secluded corner of the Royal Menagerie. Here there’s just stone and shadow – perfect for the two men to hide. The Warrior crawls on top of Zenos to keep him still, and thanks Hydaelyn that he isn’t bleeding out. But his body is nearly drained of aether, and doesn’t seem to be regenerating it.

 _‘Of course not… he’s Garlean. Shit. What am I supposed to do?’_ He rifles through his internal knowledge of magic, every tool in his Red Mage arsenal almost too taxing to even try and cast as he is now. But there’s something he can do – Vercure, enough to mend wounds and restore aether to those in sore need of it.

Zenos’s head rolls back and he stares up at the sky, panting softly. His thighs are spread, coat and belts in disarray with the bright scarf around his waist soaked in blood. Whether it’s his own or the Warrior’s doesn’t matter – it’s a novel sensation, to be so fatigued his limbs are leaden and his chest aches. There are dried tears on his cheeks and a few spots of wetness in his breeches. And the Warrior of Light, a mere sliver of a Mi’qote, is sitting on him. Through his third eye he observes the man, wispy curls of golden blonde hair fluffing about his smooth, soft cheeks. He feels like nothing, so light upon the prince’s weary thighs. He’s casting something and a fresh, cool sensation washes over Zenos from head to toe as his aethers are restored. A soft groan vibrates in his throat, deepening to a heavy sigh.

“That better?” The Warrior whispers, adjusting himself to more comfortably fit amongst Zenos’s many, many armor pieces. He receives only a silent nod in reply, Zenos still looking up at the sky from which he fell. Shinryu’s power vanquished, his own barely enough to sustain him… And still, the bliss endures. He closes his eyes, opening them to meet the Warrior’s intense gaze. A lazy smile spreads across his face.

“My first and only friend. My hunter.”

The Warrior grins, a light flush touching his cheeks. “Reckon we can call it equal?”

Zenos manages to nod, and raise his arms. Suddenly the Warrior is crushed in a grand embrace, Zenos holding him close to his chest like a child unwilling to part with an old stuffed toy. He endures it, chuckling softly and pressing his face into the man’s neck. Again Zenos feels a thrill, as if the Warrior could rip out his jugular then and there.

“You could still do it.” Zenos purrs, tilting his head to brush his lips past the Warrior’s cheek. “Bleed me dry, here and now.”

“But I won’t.” The Warrior responds, and instead gives him a soft nip on the jaw. Zenos flinches, expecting it to hurt and feeling nothing more than curious pleasure. “We’re friends now, you said so yourself. And friends don’t kill each other. But I’ll spar with you as much as you like once we’re…” He trails off. _‘Where do we go next? The Scions will come looking for us-’_ A hand to his ear, the Warrior yanks out his linkpearl and crushes it between two fingers. _‘No chances. No tracking. I’m going to be free._ ’ Zenos observes, blinking rapidly until the Warrior looks him dead in the eyes and speaks.

“I’m _yours_ now.”

**Author's Note:**

> writing is hard


End file.
